Challenge Accepted
by Polyglyph
Summary: Tucker and Sam have a dispute about video games and decide to settle the matter for good. Danny, on the other hand, just wants to have a calm, normal Friday night for a change.


**Challenge Accepted**

It was a rare occurrence when Tucker Foley came to school looking utterly exhausted. Time after time, Danny had seen him pull an all-night gaming session and be fine the next day, running purely on several cans of caffeine. Danny wished he could have that sort of energy after his own late nights and early mornings. And he knew the gap between their activities contributed to why that could never happen. Sure, kicking Skulker's butt had become fun in its own way after his threat level had diminished from mortal danger to nuisance. But even then, using ghost powers for hours on end was far more tiring than sitting in a chair and playing video games.

That wasn't the only reason, though. Tucker was definitely a night owl by nature. Danny, meanwhile, was becoming increasingly aware of all the sleep he _wasn't_ getting. Tucker could work off of twenty hours a week and still manage straight 'A's. Danny struggled just to stay awake in class. More than just their habits, the two were creatures of their own biology. Danny was convinced he'd drawn the short straw.

So when Tucker met him in the halls Friday morning looking like he'd just stepped out of a therapy session with Spectra, Danny knew there was a problem.

"Yikes, Tucker, what happened?"

Tucker tried to paint on a gloating smile, but it crumbled quickly. "The new 'Call to Arms' game just went into closed beta. And Fryertuck got an invite."

The news should have been delivered with a good bit more excitement and a lot more boasting. "Really? That's awesome, Tuck! How was it? Better than the last one?"

Tucker sighed. "Yeah, it was okay, I guess."

"You guess? Come on, Tuck, you gotta give me more than that." Danny pulled open his locker and began to collect his belongings for first period.

"What do you want me to say?"

Danny couldn't understand why his friend was being modest. Tucker's FPS skills were practically legendary. "That you spent all night destroying newbs, duh."

"More like _got_ destroyed. I couldn't get a single kill on her!"

Danny suddenly had a sinking feeling in his stomach. "Her? You don't mean—"

His friend answered with a glum nod. "That's exactly who I mean."

"Good morning, boys!" Danny and Tucker turned to face Sam. She stood with her bag slung across her back, one hand at her shoulder gripping the strap. The other was at her hip, and she wore a smirk that could put Vlad's to shame. At the same time, Danny noticed her bloodshot, half-lidded eyes with rings underneath, and her unusually slack posture. She looked like she might fall over any minute.

Tucker glared halfheartedly at the goth. "If you're just here to rub it in, then hurry up and get it over with."

Sam's smile looked positively evil. "What do you mean? I was just going to tell Danny how Chaos kicked your butt for six hours straight last night."

"Guys, do we have to do this right now?"

"I'm with Danny on this one."

Sam laughed while turning the combination lock. "Sorry. I forgot that girls don't play video games." Her smile disappeared when the lock wouldn't come undone. She tried again, and nothing happened.

Danny was certainly the most awake of the three. "Sam, that's not your locker." She looked up at the number, grinned sheepishly, and moved one door over. The warning bell began to ring.

"Whatever," Tucker said. "I'm out of here. See you guys at lunch."

As he sulked down the hallway, Danny closed his locker and sighed. "Do you two have to fight first thing in the morning?"

"Fight? What are you talking about, Danny? It's just a game, a little friendly competition. Tucker can handle losing to a girl. His ego isn't _that_ big." Danny raised an eyebrow and waited. After a beat, Sam finally relented. "Okay, maybe I'm wrong."

Danny waited as Sam closed her locker and zipped up her bag. "Trust me. You're wrong."

Tucker's sour mood hadn't improved by lunch, but Sam was more or less indifferent to his wounded pride, laying on a few jabs before Danny had even touched his mystery-loaf. That was all it took to start a war of bickering between the two.

"Get off your high horse, already. You're good at one game. So what?"

"Last time I checked, Tucker, I kick your butt in Doomed, too."

"Guys."

"Real impressive when you just buy the premium items."

"I was on the leaderboards long before they even introduced pay-to-play. Can you say that?"

"Guys?"

"Like I need to. I have high scores in over thirty games across a dozen genres. Nobody's even heard of Chaos in the fighter community."

"That's because real gamers play RTS games."

"Guys!" They stopped and looked at Danny. "Can we please just eat without all the arguing and yelling? It's not going to prove anything." Both of them began to grin. Danny knew he'd just stepped on a landmine.

"Danny's right," Sam said. "There's only one way to settle this."

Tucker folded his arms. "I couldn't agree more. Video game tournament. Tonight."

"Five games each. Winner is the better gamer."

"Loser buys Nasty Burger for the weekend."

Sam stuck out her hand. Tucker didn't hesitate either. "Deal!" they said. Danny just rolled his eyes and bitterly poked at his food.

Tonight was supposed to be movie night.

Throughout the rest of the day, Tucker attended class in what Danny assumed to be a meditative state, his fingers air-drumming just above his desk where a keyboard was meant to be. The few times he was called out for "sleeping" or not paying attention, he apologized to the teacher, but within minutes was back at it again. To Danny, and to probably everyone else, it looked patently ridiculous.

"Tucker, is that really going to help?" he whispered.

"It might!" he defended just as quietly. "This isn't like one of your ghost fights, Danny. This is Sam we're talking about. I have to be in perfect, battle-ready condition."

Danny gave him a withering look that went unnoticed. Good to know that his occasionally life-and-death battles were less dire than a wager about video games. "But this _can't_ be that productive. Shouldn't you just focus on which games to choose?"

Tucker laughed. "I already know the five games I can't possibly lose at. Now I just have to steal one or two wins from her."

"Fenton! Foley!" the teacher yelled. "Quit talking, or you'll both receive detention!" The rest of the class began to snicker. Tucker and Danny stared at each other, shrugged, and then both pretended to resume their note-taking. It wasn't two minutes later when Tucker was already back in his gaming trance.

In physics, he sat beside Sam and tried to convince her that they should just abandon the tournament and go back to movie night like planned. "C'mon Danny, this is going to be way more fun. And Tucker started this whole argument in the first place."

"Uh, pretty sure you started it. After I told you not to egg him on."

Sam blinked, remembering the conversations in the hallway and cafeteria. "Oh, right."

"Besides, you know Tucker doesn't have the money to treat you to Nasty Burger for the whole weekend."

At that, Sam smiled deviously. "That's what makes it so great. Once I win, I'll lord it over him until he pays me back. Then he'll always know who the better gamer is!" Danny was only surprised she didn't add a "mwahaha" at the end. He went back to his notes on trajectory as a parabolic function of time, sketching a wavy aura around the ball in his diagram and turning it into one of his newer abilities, what he'd dubbed a "ghost grenade." When he later looked over to check on Sam, he found her starting to nod off as she stared at the board.

The remaining classes thankfully seemed to breeze by, and only twice did Danny need to duck out with his usual excuse to deal with ghosts. The first was Technus, who had somehow overheard their tournament plans and challenged Danny to the same kind of wager, with the winnings being control of Amity Park. Danny's response was to capture him in the Fenton Thermos. The second ghost was the Box Ghost, who (like always) threatened Danny with imminent, ambiguous, box-themed doom. There wasn't much to do here, either. The moment he pulled out the Thermos, the Box Ghost fled. All in all, a normal, doom-free Friday.

When the school day ended, the trio met up, finalized their plans, and then went their separate ways. But not before Danny caught Tucker and Sam staring each other down with cocky grins like two cowboys about to duel. His only consolation was that at least they were no longer arguing.

* * *

"All right," Danny announced, standing between his two friends as the referee. They were in Sam's lavish basement, which was complete with a number of vintage arcade consoles and refurbished antique gaming systems, all along a single wall. On the other wall was her family's private bowling lanes. And in the corner were two sofas at a right angle, each facing a large flat-screen TV hooked up to a computer. In addition to their nightly belongings, Danny and Tucker brought everything they might need, fully intending to stay over long after the tournament ended and likely crash there as well. In Danny's case, that meant a spare thermos and a few ecto-weapons for his friends, in case a ghost or two tried to ruin his evening. In Tucker's case, it meant his weapons of choice: a generic controller, and his trusty mouse and keyboard. Sam likewise carried a controller, as well as an arcade-style gamepad with a joystick and four buttons. "Just so we're clear. You'll take turns picking up to five games each. The match will be best of eleven, and I'll decide the tie-breaking game if we need one. Each game will have its own best of three, except for the tie-breaker. In-game rules will be determined and agreed upon on a case-by-case basis. Any questions?"

"Yeah," Tucker said, "who has to cheer up Sam when she loses?"

Sam smirked. "More like, who's gonna lend Tucker money when _he_ loses?"

"Okay," Danny continued, "if there are no _actual_ questions, then let's get started." He flipped a coin. "Tucker, call it."

"Heads."

He caught and revealed it. "Tails. Sam, you go first." And so they began.

The first game, to Tucker's chagrin, was the most recent "Call to Arms" game, a safe choice for Sam considering how badly she'd beaten Tucker at the newest version's beta just last night. Danny watched the two playing on their separate TVs, and while Tucker put up one heck of a fight, it just wasn't enough. Sam took the first victory.

"Worried yet, Tucker?"

"In your dreams."

Next, Tucker chose a competitive platformer. The goal was to outlast the opponent in a randomly generated map filled with traps and enemies. Sam, having never seen the game, played better than almost any novice would, but Tucker still won handily.

"Mm-mm. I can almost taste the free Nasty Burger."

Sam's frown widened into a determined grin. "I'm just getting started, techno-dork."

The margin of victory in the games that followed grew smaller and smaller. Sam picked an arena RTS. Tucker picked a rhythm game. They both narrowly won at their own selections. But that's when it changed. Sam brought out her gamepad and chose an indie fighting game. One she probably expected Tucker to utterly fail at. The problem was that she had apparently forgotten Tucker's boasting at lunch. As Danny well knew, there wasn't a fighting game that Tucker hadn't played at least once. Tucker stole that victory and took the advantage.

Instead of slowing down, Tucker seized on the opportunity to grab another point, choosing a top-down shooter of the sub-genre colloquially known as "bullet hell." Sam was no newcomer to the genre by any stretch, but Tucker chose the hardest one he'd heard of, a game neither of them had played. Tucker won that one, too.

Sam began to lose her smile. Down by two points now, she steeled herself and chose her next game carefully. A racing game. Sam won. Then Tucker chose a horde survival game. Sam won again and evened up the score. Going for the three-peat like Tucker had, she then chose a tower defense game. It was the closest game of the night by far, but Sam took the lead.

Danny felt it was the perfect time for more junk food, and they took a short break. After two hours, the score stood five against four, in Sam's favor. If Tucker lost again, Sam would win. If he won, there'd be a tie-breaker. Danny and Sam grabbed another slice of cold pizza, while Tucker downed an entire can of Mountain Mist and wiped his brow, carefully considering what his next pick would be. Danny could guess what he was thinking. It wasn't just about the Nasty Burger, although he certainly wanted that too. It was about the bragging rights. That's what he and Sam were both striving for.

Danny looked over at his other friend to see how she was doing. Her eyes were drooping, a full missed sleep cycle taking its toll. Actually, Tucker didn't seem to be faring much better. Even as he decided on the tenth and potentially final game, he looked like he was about to pass out.

It was finally time. Tucker pulled a case from Sam's shelf. "This one."

Just like any good referee, Danny abandoned all pretenses of neutrality and tried to weigh in. "Uh, Tuck, are you sure?" His pick was a console shooter. However, this one had a catch. It was a game where the objective wasn't to rack up kills, but to claim territory. Essentially a strategy game. Even so, Tucker had to know this was a dangerous move. Sam had won every strategy and shooter so far, and hearing his choice, she sported a grin a mile long, confident that the tournament was as good as over.

"Yeah, Tucker, at least make it a challenge."

Tucker smiled back confidently. "Don't worry. I'll go easy on you." They traded a few jabs through the loading and character-select screens. But when the countdown began, they instantly quieted. Sam looked determined. Tucker looked serene. The word "GO!" appeared on the screen, and the two leapt into action.

Three minutes is all they had, and they used every second. Paint was thrown everywhere, Sam and Tucker speeding across the field and claiming territory wherever they could. Occasionally their paths crossed, and Tucker was always on the losing end of those exchanges, dying and having to wait to respawn. But from a ground view, it was hard to tell who was winning. The time ticked down. One minute. Thirty seconds. The whistle blew; the round ended; and Sam came away with the win.

"Hah. Easy!"

Danny sighed. "Tuck, I tried to warn you."

"Relax, Danny," Tucker said, not the slightest bit upset. "That was the freebie."

"B.S," said Sam. "You're just embarrassed you lost."

"Au contraire. It's still best of 3, Sam." That much was true. Technically, Sam needed to win one more to clench the tournament. But surely Tucker wasn't stupid enough to throw a round on his tournament game…was he?

They queued up a rematch and selected the same characters as before. The countdown sounded, and then they were off. But by thirty seconds in, the battle had departed sharply from the previous round. And all Danny could do was watch in astonishment as his best friend howled with laughter and his other best friend muttered violently.

It was a complete reversal. More so than Danny could have ever predicted. Tucker dominated the stage, claiming territory and killing Sam at every opportunity. Appearing out of nowhere as if he had ghost powers of his own, and then crossing and painting the map while Sam waited to respawn. She became so focused on defense that eventually, she wasn't even trying to grab territory, treating the game like the standard shooter but unable to pin her opponent down. Before either she or Danny knew it, three minutes was up. Tucker won by a landslide.

She glared at the boy. "I hate you so much right now."

Tucker was still laughing. "What's wrong, Sam? I thought you said this game was 'easy.'"

She smashed the button to launch the next round. "This time, you're toast."

"But does he have to be toast, specifically?"

"Shut it, Danny!"

The third and final fight began. Sam changed up her play-style, putting a greater emphasis on evasion and painting. But it wasn't enough. Tucker was toying with her. His timing, his movement, his attacks, everything he did was seamless and efficient. She countered his aggression with a bit of improvisation, and it was working to an extent, keeping her alive longer than the last round. But try as she might, she couldn't land a single kill. With less than a minute to go, she knew it was over.

The whistle blew. Tucker stood and stretched. "You were right, Sam. That _was_ easy."

"Oh, ha ha. Enjoy it while you can, Foley. This just means I get to beat you in the tie breaker. Danny, what are we playing?"

"Yeah, Danny. What game will earn me a weekend of free Nasty Burger?"

Danny came clean. "Actually, I haven't thought of one yet. I kind of thought Tuck was gonna lose."

"Oh, ye of little faith."

Sam rolled her eyes. "Then hurry up and come up with something."

"Okay, okay," he continued. "Give me a second." He began to pace as he wondered what to choose. To keep things interesting, it needed to be a genre they hadn't played yet. Preferably something new to both of them. Something fast-paced, challenging, and competitive. A memorable title to close out the tournament. Something like…

"I got it! The tie-breaking game will be—drum roll, please."

Tucker began playing the requested sound effect from his phone. Sam looked over, a raised brow in disbelief. "You just happened to have that ready?"

"Thanks, Tuck."

"Any time, dude."

Danny cleared his throat melodramatically. "The final game of the evening, to decide who is the best gamer, the fearsome Chaos or the mighty Fryertuck, will be none other than…" The drum roll stopped. "Tetris!"

His friends stared at him in silence. Danny just waited.

And waited.

Eventually, Tucker was the first to speak up. "Any chance we could play something from this millennium?"

Danny feigned offense. "It's a timeless classic!"

Sam chimed in, echoing Tucker's sentiment. "Come on, Danny. That's really the game you want us to end with? You might as well have chosen Pong!"

"What do you have against Pong?" Sam groaned, but Danny was struggling to keep a straight face. "Have either of you even _played_ Tetris?" They both hedged with awkward half-answers. "Exactly my point. Neither of you have any practice with it, so it's perfectly fair."

Tucker and Sam tried to argue but eventually resigned themselves to Danny's choice. Meanwhile, the ghost boy was doing everything he could to keep from laughing. His friends deserved a little torment for postponing movie night.

Sam grabbed her controller, and Tucker grabbed his keyboard. After a quick download and install, the game was set to begin. There would be no best of three this time. Whoever won this round won the bet.

But as the blocks began to fall, Danny quickly realized there was a problem. Namely, that his friends were _terrible_ at Tetris. Tucker could never decide where to put the blocks, even as he accelerated their fall. Sam tried to match pace with Tucker, but she frequently over-rotated her pieces by accident. Neither of them seemed to have a long-term plan, and with all the mistakes, both their screens filled up quickly.

The grand finale was anything but. In less than a minute, the game was over.

"YES!"

"NO!"

Sam reached the top first. By sheer dumb luck, Tucker had won.

The computer geek jumped off the couch, arms raised in a victory pose. "Yeah! Who's the best? I'm the best!"

Sam somehow carefully but forcefully placed her controller on the couch. "Fine, you win." She stood up and brushed off her skirt. "Are we done, now? Because I'm going to bed."

"Yeah, we're done," said Danny. He wasn't going to try to convince her to stay up later, even if it was only nine thirty. She was obviously running on fumes as it was.

"Good. Feel free to crash on the couches. Sheets and spare pillows are in the guest room closet." With a final wave, she headed upstairs. "Night, guys."

Danny was just glad the ordeal was finally over. "Congratulations, Tucker." Although to be honest, he had been rooting for Sam.

"Thanks, man." Tucker fell into the recliner and pulled out the leg rest. "Victory is sweet. Just like that Nasty Burger milkshake is gonna be tomorrow."

"I bet." Danny chuckled and began looking through his bag, finding and removing the disc he'd brought with him, _Night of the Zombie Teachers 5._ "So, ready for the movie?"

No response.

"Tucker?"

Danny turned around to find him laying in the chair, eyes closed, breathing softly. Sighing to himself, Danny walked over to the player and inserted the disc anyway. His friends would just have to see it some other time. He'd planned to watch this movie tonight, and nothing short of a ghost attack was going to stop him.

He wasn't wrong. Ten minutes in, his ghost sense went off, and Danny groaned. He had the feeling it was going to be a long night.

* * *

A/N: This started as a writing prompt I did while struggling with my other stories. Hope you enjoyed it, and thanks for reading.


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